HTVN Spotlights Powerful Women in Healthtech

Women are entering health-tech more than ever before. In a field largely dominated by men, these women entrepreneurs and inventors are making exciting contributions. Here are five power women in healthtech making headlines.

Amy Baxter

Dr. Amy Baxter is the CEO and Founder of MMJ Labs, and the inventor of Buzzy®[1]. Buzzy is a palm-sized, bee-shaped device that reduces the pain of a shot. Buzzy uses cold and vibrating stimuli to distract the patient and provide natural pain relief. Dr. Baxter established MMJ Labs in 2006 and launched Buzzy in 2009. Since then, the product has been adopted by over 5,000 hospitals and MMJ Labs is expanding into other pain-relieving products. Dr. Baxter graduated from Yale University and Emory Medical School in emergency pediatric medicine. Watch her talk on TEDMED: http://www.tedmed.com/talks/show?id=299421.

Carolyn Yarina

Carolyn Yarina is the CEO of Sisu Global Health. The health-tech startup has created a product called Hemafuse.[2] “The Hemafuse is a handheld, mechanical device for intraoperative autotransfusion of blood collected from an internal hemorrhage, meant to replace or augment donor blood in emergency situations.”[3] Basically, the device is able to provide emergency transfusions, and is intended for patients in developing countries who don’t have access to hospitals with transfusion equipment. The device is reusable up to 50 times and can be sterilized between uses. Yarina and her team recently gained recognition from AOL Founder Steve Case’s “Rise of the Rest” –a national bus tour that conducts startup competitions in host cities. Sisu Global Health won the Baltimore competition in September of 2015 and was awarded a $100,000 check by Steve Case. Yarina graduated with a BSE in chemical engineering from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

Nina Nashif

Nina Nashif is the Founder and CEO of Healthbox[4], a business accelerator that invests seed money in health-tech startups. Healthbox’s mission is to connect entrepreneurs to the industry resources they need to succeed. Nashif’s emphasis isn’t on disrupting healthcare, but on bolstering entrepreneurs so they can come alongside already-established businesses and systems and collaborate to make health-tech better.[5] Healthbox has 55 companies and operates in Boston, Chicago, Jacksonville, Nashville and London.[6] Nashif graduated from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign with a B.S. in Community Health and from Washington University School of Medicine with an M.S. in Health Care Administration.

Katherine Ryder

Katherine Ryder is the Founder and CEO of Maven[7], a platform that gives women immediate and easy video appointment access to doctors and specialists in women’s and children’s health. Users pay up-front for a medical consultation with a professional. Appointments start at $18. Maven is meant to be a happy medium between Googling one’s symptoms an inconvenient trip to the doctor’s office. Ryder hopes that Maven will facilitate long-term relationships between its users and practitioners.[8] Before launching Maven in 2015, Ryder attended the University of Michigan for undergrad and the London School of Economics for graduate school.

Janica Alvarez

As the Founder and CEO of Naya Health[9], and the mother of three boys, Janica Alvarez experienced frustration with cumbersome breast pumps. That’s how she came up with the idea of a smart breast pump that would be easier to use and offer better functionality. The Naya breast pump is reportedly small enough to fit in a pocket and has smart features, such as the real-time tracking of a woman’ milk production.[10] Before founding Naya, Alvarez worked in the pharmaceutical industry, gaining FDA review and approval for HIV and oncology therapies.[11]

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